Posted by Larry Jordan on February 14, 2018, 11:41 pm
A long time ago I stopped looking at the puerile and putrid Holland website of the crackpot who still plasters the late Blue Boys band member Leo Jackson's picture at the top of his so-called Jim Reeves fan page (thus defying the pleading by Leo's widow, Nell, that he remove it).
But someone copied and emailed me a post made back in January in which the webmaster of that site, had what he considered a big scoop! He reports that Mary's nephew, Bill White, went to Nashville when Jim Reeves' plane went down and joined in the search party. (Yawn. There were 2,000 people searching for the plane. Why should I mention Bill when I talked about two of Mary's BROTHERS who joined the search efforts?) The Holland gadfly concludes "None of this relevant history appeared in 'Jim Reeves: His Untold Story'. Presumably the esteemed author felt no need to spend time interviewing him. Sometimes the insignificant have much to say."
The webmaster of that site has a long history of posting inaccurate information and jumping to conclusions. So let me set the record straight.
I did, indeed, talk at length with Bill White, who had been appointed by a Nashville probate court judge to supposedly oversee his aunt Mary's affairs when she went into a nursing home. Rev. White phoned me at the time the news broke that Ed and Vonna Jo Gregory had been pardoned by President Bill Clinton for bank fraud convictions. When he got me on the phone, White immediately told me that he did not want me to record our conversation (I suppose because he wanted deniability later). He took pains to plead ignorance as to Mr. Gregory's felony conviction. Up to that point, Mr. White had formed a close relationship with Mr. Gregory, the new owner of the Reeves estate (the latter of whom ultimately failed to pay Mary the millions of dollars he owed her).
The Presidential pardons were front page news in The New York Times because Clinton had also pardoned various other scoundrels, such as Mark Rich, a wealthy financier who fled to Switzerland after being indicted on multiple federal charges, including tax evasion, in 1983. Clinton's motive for pardoning Rich on his last day in office was questioned because Rich's ex-wife, Denise Rich, was a wealthy Democratic donor who made a $450,000 donation to Clinton's presidential library foundation and more than $100,000 to Hillary Clinton's Senate campaign.
Anyway, I digress. The Ed and Vonna Jo Gregory pardons were among those that drew Congressional scrutiny because Ed had put one of Hillary's brothers, Tony Rodham, on his payroll and loaned him money for hundreds of thousands of dollars, and then couldn't explain to Congressional investigators what Mr. Rodham actually did to earn the money. Bill White wanted me to know he was blindsided by this.
Although Rev. White insisted that I not record the conversation, I never promised him that I would not take copious notes -- which I did. As a longtime journalist I am accustomed to taking my own form of shorthand so I have verbatim quotes from him.
I also engaged him in a conversation about the abuse of Mary at the hands of her second husband, and the deplorable conditions under which she was then living. White again pleaded ignorance of these facts.
Reeves fans who have watched the long-running court cases surrounding the disposition of the Reeves estate may be aware that at one point, Bill White signed all of Mary's property over to Ed Gregory BEFORE ED PAID FOR IT, thus relinquishing Mary's security interest. White's actions in this regard are simply inexplicable.
What has not been reported up to now is that the company that bonded Mr. White was recently forced to pay a $200,000 settlement to the Reeves estate heirs as a result of White's breach of his fiduciary responsibilities. He was apparently unable to come up with more than a piddly sum himself, even though he once pastored a mega church in Texas.
Bill had aspirations of being a singer and Ed Gregory, a carnival operator by trade, was very skilled at discovering someone's Achilles Heel. He was able to manipulate White for his own purposes by flattering him with bookings at some of the fairs Ed operated, getting him Super Bowl tickets, gifting him with a red tuxedo jacket like Jim's, and even taking him to the White House.
It is indisputable that Bill White did not act in the best interests of his aunt, as the forfeiture of his bond confirms. I know the details of his various missteps and as such I DID NOT FIND HIM A CREDIBLE SOURCE FOR MY BOOK and that's why I didn't write about him. People who have committed lesser offenses involving the handling of estates and financial transactions have ended up in jail.
It is pathetic that this man continues to promote himself as Jim Reeves' nephew, when he hasn't been that for decades -- ever since Mary Reeves married another man. The only true nephew of Jim who sings is John Rex Reeves.
So now, dear fans, you know more of the "Untold story"...and the Holland website is just as inaccurate and irrelevant as it's always been. It's clear that webmaster feels Bill White has important information to convey; I think White has amply demonstrated through his actions over the years that he does NOT.
Re: Bill White
Posted by Larry Jordan on February 28, 2018, 12:11 pm, in reply to "Bill White"
After Leo Jackson passed away several years ago, the Holland webmaster quickly searched around to see if he could befriend somebody else close to Jim Reeves, that he could manipulate and curry favor with, in order to lend his poorly researched website some credibility. I heard from some of these people, who rudely rebuffed him because they knew of his long record of trying to stir up trouble and discord on the Reeves fan scene.
He finally latched onto the vainglorious Tom Perryman, who was always happy to get publicity and Tom threw a few crumbs to the Holland webmaster. That's why, if you ever glanced at that irrelevant site in hopes of finding something of merit there, you found references to Tom. Well, Mr. Perryman is recently deceased. So the webmaster now appears to have latched onto Bill White, whom I imagine will now become the new "hero" with anecdotes, etc.
I suspect that's what's behind the renewed attack on me as having been negligent in not mentioning in my book that a young Bill White went to Nashville. He writes “The news that Bill White Jr. participated in the search for his uncle is indeed a scoop. I am pretty sure that if a certain author had known it, he would have included it in his jim Reeves Story. It would have been silly to know about it and not share that information with the fans or perhaps it was an act of censorship? Keeping an historical fact hidden introduces the risk that someone else could publish it and have a scoop.”
A SCOOP? Thanks for the laugh. Bill White personally told me he went to Nashville, so I was aware of it. I also have a copy of Mary’s mother’s diary, in which she mentioned her thoughts about the tragic events and how members of her family rushed to Nashville.
As I reported in my book, I also interviewed John White who, along with Mary’s brother Fred, played a more important role in events. Fred stayed at the crash scene when the wreckage was found (he was a Houston based attorney), while John went to the Reeves home to tell their sister Mary that her husband was found. Bill White was just one of 2000 people out searching and had no role of consequence, so it surely was not “silly” for me to leave him out of my narrative.
But if the Holland webmaster is so desperate to have a real “scoop,” why hasn’t he posted the rare recordings and photos of artifacts owned by his Knoxville buddy and longtime collector of Reeves memorabilia? They both claimed repeatedly for years that they were just waiting for my book to come out, before they would release these rarities. (The goal being to try to foil my research). Well, my book came out in 2011 and we are STILL WAITING for these supposedly important items to be shared with the fans. I predicted years ago they were lying, and it now is clear that they were.
A weak defense for years of putrid comments
Posted by Larry Jordan on March 5, 2018, 5:46 pm, in reply to "Re: Bill White"
As expected, the Holland webmaster never explained why it was he and his Knoxville (Jim Reeves collector) friend kept promising they'd share rarities with the fans as soon as my book came out, and then failed to do so. There is no other explanation except the fact that they LIED.
He brags on the fact that each year he and a handful of his friends put flowers on the graves of Mary and Jim Reeves, and also Dean Manuel. A nice gesture, to be sure.
Too bad the webmaster PUBLICLY ATTACKED Mary when she was alive by writing a nasty letter to the editor of a country music magazine holding her up to public ridicule (another reason she despised him, according to those close to her. Need I list names?) She had shown him hospitality when he visited Nashville and then he slapped her down by complaining about her and portraying Mary in a bad light. Come to think of it, maybe he has a guilty conscience over that incident and that's why he honors her now with flowers. Naw, that can't be it. He has no conscience. Or he wouldn't have repeatedly promoted a trash site that contained anonymous personal attacks on my family, friends and me...until the FBI shut it down, obtained the posting log, and even SENT FEDERAL LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENTS to the Holland webmaster's buddy to warn him against further posts...including his bizarro post that my young daughter needed to be "rescued" from the Jordan home because my wife Julie and I were supposedly "indoctrinating" our child with "the occult." The employer of the Holland webmaster's friend assured us in writing he was getting "counseling".
That's how wacko it became. And one of the people who posted attacks on me for years is now one of my biggest supporters after my book came out...
So whoever ghost wrote the response on the Holland site chose to overlook the long history of nasty personal attacks including the direct involvement by the Holland webmaster in the trash site, as the FBI identified it.
And let's not forget the horrible letter he sent to a grieving widow, Nell Jackson, right after Leo died, deriding her and bragging he knew Leo was going to take his own life before he did so. Plus the fact he continues to use Leo's photo as a banner on his website despite the repeated requests of Mrs. Jackson that he remove it.